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How to change your WhatsApp Business number without losing your chats

Published on October 15, 2026

You can change your WhatsApp Business number without losing your chats.

The trick is to use the Change number feature, not just pop in the new SIM card and register the app again.

According to the WhatsApp Help Center, the change moves your profile photo, name, privacy settings, contacts, individual chats and group chats to the new number.

The account on the old number is deleted, so it disappears from your customers’ contact lists.

Before you change it: what to check

The official page on how to change your number asks you to check three things first:

  • The new number can receive SMS texts or calls, because that’s how the confirmation code arrives.
  • The old number is registered on WhatsApp. To see which one it is, open Settings and tap your profile photo.
  • The new number is supported. Internet numbers (known as VoIP), toll-free numbers (in Brazil, the ones starting with 0800), premium numbers and numbers not tied to a carrier don’t work.

One detail that matters for businesses: landlines are accepted, but only on the WhatsApp Business app, as the same official page notes.

And you can only change the number on your primary phone.

It can’t be done from WhatsApp Web or the desktop app.

Step by step on the same phone

This is the path the Help Center describes for Android.

Put the new SIM card in your phone and:

  1. Tap the three dots and go to Settings, Account, Change number and Next.
  2. Enter the old number in the first field and the new one in the second, both in full international format. For a Brazilian number, that’s 55, the area code and the number.
  3. Tap Next and choose whether to notify your contacts: all of them, only the ones you’ve chatted with, or a list you pick.
  4. Tap Done and confirm the new number with the code you receive.

On iPhone, the iOS version of the page starts from Settings or your profile photo, and the rest is the same.

The groups you’re in are notified of the change either way, even if you don’t turn on the notice to your contacts.

If you’re changing phones too

Here the order matters.

First, change the number on your old phone.

Then make a fresh backup, already under the new number, to your Google Account on Android or to iCloud on iPhone.

Only then install the app on the new phone, confirm the new number and restore that backup.

That’s the sequence on the official page.

The reason is in the Help Center: a cloud backup is tied to the number it was made with.

After the change, backups from the old number can’t restore anything.

That’s why, even if you keep the same phone, it’s worth making a new backup right after you change the number.

Who to tell first

The Help Center recommends telling your contacts before the change and asking them to save the new number.

If you use broadcast lists, this matters even more: broadcast messages only reach people who saved the new number in their phone’s contacts.

Customers who didn’t save it stop receiving them.

Two more points from the same page: people you blocked stay blocked and aren’t told about the new number.

And a change made by mistake can’t be undone.

If you go back to the old number, you’ll have to ask the group admins to add you again.

What still points to the old number

The app moves the account, but it doesn’t change anything outside it.

A wa.me link has the number right in the address, as the official click to chat page shows, so every old link stops reaching you.

It’s worth checking:

  • The WhatsApp link or button in your Instagram bio.
  • The button on your website and contact page.
  • The QR code printed on menus, business cards, shop windows or packaging.
  • Ads that open a WhatsApp chat.
  • Your Google business profile and any other listing where customers look for your contact details.

And if you want to go back to regular WhatsApp

You can also move your WhatsApp Business account to regular WhatsApp, but you can’t use the same number on both apps at the same time.

The Help Center warns that Business features don’t come along: catalog items and collections, for example, are left behind.

Where we come in

A lot of number changes start with wanting to keep personal and business apart.

If that’s your case, it’s a good time to think about how the new number will handle customers.

The assistant we set up sits on your business number with your company’s content, books times on your real calendar and hands over to a person anything off script.

Once the new number is shared in the right places, customers show up and get an answer.

Sources